Being Ranked 11, Etsy is one of the largest online shopping platforms in the world. Millions of people visit Etsy every day with the intent to purchase custom crafts, t-shirts, posters, and vintage products.
Being a shopping marketplace, anyone can set up their own shop and sell their own products on Etsy.
This means that you too, can start selling on Etsy and reach an audience on millions.
And while the majority of Etsy sellers are creating things from home, you don’t actually have to do that. There’s an alternative called Etsy Print On Demand.
This article will cover the 3 best print on demand partners that you can easily integrate with Etsy.
Why You Should Use Print On Demand For Etsy
Print on Demand dropshipping is a business model where a supplier prints and fulfills orders for you.
This means that you can sell products with your own designs on them, without actually storing, printing or shipping these designs yourself.
Examples of these products are T-shirts, mugs, posters and so on. You can find a print on demand supplier for pretty much everything.
The big advance of the POD business model, is that you don’t have any upfront costs. You only pay the supplier, once someone has already ordered from you.
You keep the profits!
Why You Should Integrate Print On Demand With Etsy
Print on Demand dropshipping has been around for a while now and hundreds of companies have popped up.
This gives you many options when it comes to selling print on demand products on Etsy. However, only a select few actually integrate with Etsy.
Etsy integration means that the products are synced between Etsy and your POD app. This way, you don’t have to fulfill order manually.
When a customer orders from your Etsy shop, all of the information will be sent to your print on demand supplier. They will then take care of the printing and shipping process for you.
This means that you, as the shop owner, only have to worry about creating and listing the products and offering customer service.
My Top Pick: Printful
When it comes to Print on Demand, Printful is the queen.
With warehouses all over the world, Printful is the biggest POD supplier out there. Since their start in 2013, they have successfully delivered over 22.7M products all over the world.
Every product you sell on Etsy through Printful is white-label. This means that your etsy customers will never know that your orders come from Printful. Every package comes in a generic package with your shop name and logo.
If you want, you can also add coupons, flyer, business cards or even handwritten thank-you cards inside your package for an extra fee.
Printful isn’t my top pick just because it’s big, it’s my top pick because it’s easy, and complete.
Printful is the only POD supplier out there that prints in-house with multiple locations around the world. This means that they not only ship worldwide, they can do so cheaply and quickly.
Printful has a wide range of products. The main categories are apparel, accessories and home decor.
Another huge advantage of Printful is that they have great support, something I cannot say for every POD supplier out there.
If I have an issue with an order, I know I can contact Printful to set things straight for me.
Printful Drawbacks
The main flaw is the price of the products. The main reason people step away from Printful and opt for one of its competitors is because Printful is probably one of (if not) the most expensive POD suppliers out there.
This is only logical when you think about the fact that they do everything in-house, have good support and amazing print-quality.
But it does affect your profit margins.
Printful Etsy Integration
Printful easily integrates with Etsy. You can read my other article on how to integrate Printful with Etsy.
Printify
Next up we have Printify. Printify is probably Printful’s biggest competitor. However, it operates a bit differently.
First of all, Printify does not offer in-house printing. Instead, they outsource all of their printing jobs to different suppliers which you can pick from.
Every supplier will have a different “Print Provider Ranking” which is based on the print ratio, delayed production ratio and user reviews.
Every supplier also has different production times, shipping locations and times and different pricing for their products.
These Printify suppliers tend to be cheaper than Printful which is why they are commonly used as an alternative to Printful.
Printify is free but a premium plan of $29 per month can be bought to receive a 20% discount on all products. This can save you $2-6 on purchases, meaning the premium plan will start increasing your profits as soon as you hit 30+ orders a month.
This 20% discounted premium plan and the availability of multiple suppliers offering low pricing is why Printify is so beloved in the print on demand community and often used as an alternative to Printful.
Many different suppliers also means that you can find many products on Printify that you otherwise wouldn’t find on Printful.
Printify drawbacks
First off, is the support. If you’re used to Printful support, Printify support will be a pain. When you’re talking to Printify support, you’re really talking to a Printify customer service agent who has nothing to do with the printing process. You cannot talk to suppliers directly which can become a pain when you’re having issues.
The next flaw is the shipping pricing. You need to be very careful with checking the pricing of shipping as some suppliers will give you crazy high shipping pricing. Especially when it comes to international shipping.
Printify has suppliers from all over the world (al though the majority are in the US) but whenever these suppliers have to ship cross-continental they tend to charge rates of over $16.
This means that if you have an order from Europe but your synced Printify supplier is in the US, they can charge $16 shipping on that order, leaving you with no profits or even a loss on the order.
Printify Etsy Integration
Printify easily integrates with Etsy. You can read my other article on how to integrate Printify with Etsy.
Gooten
Just like Printify, Gooten outsources their printing jobs to different suppliers. Currently, there are 35 print providers in 40 different locations within the Gooten network.
The difference between Gooten and Printify is that Gooten does not let you pick a print provider, they do that for you.
So you cannot test different suppliers on production quality, print quality, and shipping times as you can with Printify suppliers.
Gooten drawbacks
The main Gooten flaw is the support. If you run into an issue with Gooten, you’ll have to contact their support and they are slow, very slow. On their website it says that they will reply within 72 hours but I’ve found that sometimes it takes even longer than that.
Gooten Etsy Integration
Just like Printful and Printify, Gooten seamlessly integrates with Etsy. Go here to integrate with Etsy.
Comparing Printful vs Printify vs Gooten
Let’s do a quick comparison using the Bella + Canvas 3001 T-shirt on all three platforms.
For Printify we are going with the “The dream junction” supplier which offers the cheapest option.
Pricing
As you can see, Printful is the most expensive one across the board. Printify offers the most competitive pricing coming in at a total of just $10.91 when shipped to the US using the premium plan.
Gooten offers a nice in-between of $12.89 for the same shirt and beats Printify when it comes to international pricing.
Winner: Printify, even without their premium subscription model where you save an extra 20% Printify wins the pricing bracket. If you are profit-oriented, Printify is the way to go.
Print Quality
For the print quality section, you can check out the video below where Merch Lifestyle compared a bunch of different Print on Demand brands on the “Bella Canvas 3001” T-shirt. Including Printful, Printify, and Gooten which integrates with Etsy.
Printful
Printful is known for their amazing print quality. In a report, they published that they invested 20M$ in top-of-the-line printing machines and they definitely deliver. While others are cheaper, Printful does not cheap out on ink and leaves a nice and vibrant design that looks identical to the on-screen version.
Printify
The print came out with a faded look, which Printify is known for. Even with other suppliers, it seems Printify always gives you a faded look which means colors will look different from on-screen.
That’s something you gotta realize when you opt for Printify. You’ll get bigger profits especially with the premium plan but you’ll also have lower print quality.
Gooten
While the colors are slightly better than Printify, the Gooten shirt still comes out faded. Especially when compared to the vibrant colors on Printful.
Winner: Printful, when looking at the quality of the prints it’s very clear that Printful outperforms its competitors. This is only logical if you consider than Printful is at least $5 more expensive than Printify and Gooten. Those two clearly save on ink to offer a more competitive pricing.
Overall Best Print on Demand Supplier For Etsy?
Printful, Printify, and Gooten have their benefits and drawbacks. I’d say there’s no “clear” winner between the three. It ultimately depends on your personal preferences.
If print quality is a big deal to you then Printful is the way to go.
However if you prefer higher profits it’s worth looking into Printify and Gooten as a POD supplier.
Final Thoughts
Personally, I’d say Printful is the best way to start off with print on demand on Etsy as a complete beginner. Everything is done in-house, you can easily sell worldwide and Printful has amazing print quality which will result in very little customer complaints. If you run into an issue along the way, an in-house support team is ready to help you out.
Once you get settled and used to selling print on demand products, you can start exploring different production partners such as Printify and Gooten.
This way, you can increase your profits while you scale up your business.
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